The present invention relates generally to electronic management modules and, more particularly, to those used with internal combustion engines of recreational products.
The electrical operations of an internal combustion engine are, for the most part, controlled by an electronic control unit, hereinafter, an ECU. The ECU includes a wide variety of the electrical controls necessary to operate an engine. These controls can monitor and control various aspects of engine operation including ignition, engine timing, emission systems, air and fuel systems, and temperature sensors, to name but a few.
Depending on engine performance, emission control requires more and more circuitry and/or controls on board such as ECUs. Additionally, advancements in electronic technologies have resulted in increased processing capabilities. As such, ECUs have advanced to control, regulate, and monitor more and more engine systems and properties. However, there remain some engine systems that the ECU is not suited to independently control and regulate, such as high voltage systems requiring voltage regulation.
Modern engines have a variety of needs that can benefit from a high voltage operating environment. While it is possible to provide these higher level voltages, such increased operating voltages cannot always be readily utilized by some engine components and, therefore, regulation and conditioning is required before being delivered to various engine systems. Furthermore, different engine components and systems may have different power consumption requirements and ideal power ranges within which the components and systems operate most efficiently. As such, it is often advantageous to include multiple power or voltage regulators/conditioners such that an ideal power with an ideal voltage is delivered to each of the various engine components and systems.
However, the recreational products industry is one in which size, packaging, and weight are all at the forefront of the design process. As such, having separate devices located at different locations is not just time consuming to install and wire, it reduces available space and increases overall cost. Therefore, having an ECU and various power regulators/conditioners separately mounted and wired throughout the engine is contrary to these objectives.
Additionally, it is ideal that the ECU and the power or voltage regulators/conditioners be disposed within a housing to protect the electrical components from the operating environment. However, the housings, while necessary to protect the components, adds to the size of the ECU and each power or voltage regulator/conditioner. Again, this serves contrary to the objective of minimizing the size, packaging, and weight of the recreational product engine.
It would therefore be desirable to have system whereby the ECU and power or voltage regulator/conditioner requirements of a recreational product are combined. Furthermore, it would be desirable that these requirements be met while minimizing the size, packaging, and weight of the recreational product.